


Grimoire

by Tarlan



Category: Jacob (2011)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Gen, Supernatural Elements, Trope Bingo Round 6
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-30
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-06-04 06:33:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6645265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tarlan/pseuds/Tarlan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Lawrence Kell inherited the old McLeod plantation house, he opened the gates to Hell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Grimoire

**Author's Note:**

> Written for: **btfchallenge** and **trope_bingo** Round 6: immortality/reincarnation

When the McLeod House was left to him, Lawrence was both stunned and delighted. He'd been struggling for years as a handyman, taking work wherever he could find it, and the old plantation house was still beautiful, standing on a good-sized piece of land that could be used to grow cash crops or raise some livestock. He couldn't decide which but figured he'd best spend some time making the house habitable before he moved his family out of the rundown rented house on the outskirts of the town of Melvin Falls. His father had told him stories of 'that side of the family' - the McLeods - but he knew better than to believe in old wives tales that were likely made up out of jealousy for those who had more money and owned more land than the Kells.

Perhaps he should have paid more attention to those tales, or at least gone into the house open-minded to possibilities.

He found the old book under the floor boards and was fascinated from the moment he turned the first page, reading until there was no light left in the room after the sun went down. Even then he simply switched on a flashlight, intending to stay longer until he realized he'd lost most of the day when he should have been making repairs. Images from the book seemed to seep into his mind, bringing strange dreams that bordered on nightmares. He knew it was because of the pictures, some of demonic creatures and weird symbols, and the words written in a foreign language on vellum, by something the color of dried blood. Least it felt like calf-skin rather than parchment paper. He shivered at the thought of what else it could be but then discounted the notion of it being made from human skin despite some of those frightening bedtime stories told by his father.

A word came back to him from those days seated at his maternal grandmother's knee: grimoire, a book of spells used by witches.

His father had hated his wife's mother, always fearful of her, treating her with respect and even deference when she was near but maligning her name as soon as she was out of earshot but Lawrence had adored her and she had adored him in turn, calling him her little pumpkin. She'd always smelled of lilacs and lavender. His Pa had called her Grandmother McLeod, or sometimes the Old Witch, but Lawrence always figured it was out of meanness, the usual divide between son and mother-in-law. This book though, this grimoire, suggested the name-calling was based more on fact than on bad blood within the family.

As much as he tried, he couldn't keep the thought of the book out of his head, going back day after day to take the grimoire from its hiding place and turn the thick pages. It took a while before he realized he was hearing the strange words inside his head, understanding them even though he had left school with just basic reading and writing skills. The words seemed to chant as he read them, the whisper increasing in intensity with each passing day until he felt as if the very walls of the old house were reverberating with them. Images came too, of blood sacrifices and potions bubbling, of demons lurking in the shadows waiting to pounce upon the unwary and steal their very souls.

As the days passed, he cared less and less for fixing up the house, less and less for his family - his pregnant wife and his son, Jacob. All he could do was turn the pages slowly, losing himself in the chants inside his head as the images of horror played like scenes from a horror movie. It felt as if something was trying to crawl inside his skin, taking over his mind and blackening his soul, but still he came back again and again, losing hours at a time as he turned the pages. It insinuated itself into his mind, calling for blood, and he barely registered arriving in the bar, barely recognized his wife and boy before the urge to kill overwhelmed him, until blood splattered across his face and clothing... until a bullet tore through his mortal body and dragged him back to sanity for a few blessed moments of peace before he was dragged down to Hell.

He opened his eyes to darkness, clawing his way out of the casket and through freshly dug soil until his hand broke the surface, dragging himself out of his grave. His fingernails were long and yellowed, hands spotted with marks of decay. His face was caked in dirt, his funeral clothes little more than rags covering his bones. Feeling strange but powerful as he walked through the cemetery to the old plantation house, he found it crumbled and broken, half demolished from where it had collapsed in on itself. Climbing through the debris he found the old room but the floor boards had rotted through and broken over revealing emptiness in the hollow where he had first found the grimoire. He could sense its presence though, catching its ancient scent on the Fall breeze. He could sense the presence of other beings too, ghosts who had met violent and grisly deaths, not recognizing the little girl or the large, silent man holding her hand until he felt the call of familial blood. His son, Jacob, and the boy's sister. Part of him mourned at their deaths but another part of him was already lost to the grimoire, calling for him, promising him they would be reborn in blood.

As he moved through the small town he felt himself pulled onward until he was stepping up onto an old porch, hearing the creak of a rocking chair. The grimoire was on her lap, her claw-like hands caressing the outer cover, and she looked up at him, face half shadowed in wan moonlight. She looked as ancient as the grimoire, cackling as she held the book tighter, her nails scratching the old and worn cover, catching on the raised sigils. He didn't know her face and yet he knew her, breathing in the scent of lilacs and lavender as he sank down beside her chair, resting his head against her bony knee. He felt her hand caress his hair as the chants began to fill his head once more, baying for more blood sacrifice, for the doors of Hell to open and spill out its lost and soulless spirits, its demons and familiars, just as he had released her spirit from damnation as blood splattered the bar that fateful day.

"My little pumpkin."

"Grandma," he murmured back through a throat ravaged by time and death, but the grimoire was already telling him its secrets, showing him the way back as the ancient blood of his ancestors sang through his renewing veins, giving him back the life it had stolen so he could do its bidding, forever.

END  
 


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